There’s been some reports about the response of unnamed Steelers players to wide receiver Antonio Brown’s absence from practice and inactive status in Week 17, but defensive end Cam Heyward was willing to put his name on his thoughts when discussing Brown on Wednesday.
Heyward made an appearance on WDVE and the Brown saga was a major topic of conversation. Heyward said he didn’t know the extent of what was going on with Brown until just before the Steelers faced the Bengals last Sunday and he said that the wideout has “a lot of mending” to do with teammates as a result of how things played out last week.
“We all want AB here, but to be a part of this team you can’t do that,” Heyward said. “You don’t let your brothers down. It hurt more knowing that there were multiple people in that locker room giving everything they’ve got. ... I think everybody wants AB on the team, but we’ve got to be on the same page. From the top to the bottom we all have to be accountable for it. I’m sure [General Manager] Kevin [Colbert], Coach [Mike] Tomlin will be talking to him. Going forward that’s unacceptable. We all sign up for this game and we all sign up to be part of this team.”
Heyward said he feels “unfortunate situations” have chipped away at the Steelers too often in recent seasons and that the team “can’t crack” in 2019. That requires putting things back together after a messy end to 2018.